Pigeon pie by airmail?

The View from Fez is indebted to the online Driffield Times for this week's quirky story.

Now most Moroccans will tell you that they have a love of B'astia - a local version of pigeon pie. So the news that pigeons are making their way here from Great Britain is probably seen as a good thing. But pause, and put yourself in the place of pigeon fancier Keith Sims.

Keith and one that didn't get away
Keith wasn't surprised when one of his birds didn't turn up back at the loft after a recent race - it's one of the hazards of racing pigeons. But he was surprised when he got a message from the Royal Pigeon Racing Association (RPRA) to say that his stray bird had turned up in Casablanca!

The bird was found by Mohamer Essofi, who luckily does not eat a lot of B'astia - instead it turns out he is a Moroccan pigeon fancier, and has taken the bird into his care.

But the downside of the rescue for Keith came in another message from the RPRA, telling him that the cost of having the errant pigeon returned would be more than £150.

Keith has decided on the cheaper alternative, which transfers the bird to the finder, in the hope that if his flyaway pigeon should return home in future, the transfer can be cancelled and the bird re-registered to him.

"It's very unusual to have a bird go astray by that distance," said Keith ruefully.

"I've lost them before but they usually turn up somewhere like Hull."

Tags: Morocco Fes, Maghreb news